


Baby Teeth

by austere_alacrity



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-08
Updated: 2020-06-08
Packaged: 2021-03-04 06:40:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,529
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24609325
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/austere_alacrity/pseuds/austere_alacrity
Summary: Roy is reminded, often, just how young his youngest subordinate it. Unfortunately, sometimes this reminder comes in more violent forms than others.Takes place after Ed's State Alchemist exam, but before Al comes to join him.
Relationships: Edward Elric & Roy Mustang, Edward Elric & Team Mustang
Comments: 8
Kudos: 225





	Baby Teeth

Although Colonel Roy Mustang would likely agree wholeheartedly with the charge that it was largely irresponsible to allow a 12-year old boy to join the military, it wasn’t actually true that he just threw him to the wolves without any training or preparation whatsoever. 

Edward Elric had only been under Mustang’s command for a couple months, and in that time Roy had tried to ease him into field work by having the boy accompany him and his team on their missions. Initially, Ed had been resistant to the idea- he had insisted that he wasn’t some kid that needed babysitting, and that he was more than capable of taking care of missions on his own. At the time, however, Roy had found the idea of sending a 12-year old kid out on military business entirely on his own to be nothing short of appalling. Soon enough, the boy’s brother would be joining him in East City, and once he had some reliable back up he could begin to go on missions unsupervised, but until then… well, until then Roy would continue to try to ease his guilt of creating a child soldier by keeping as close an eye on him as possible.

At the moment, it didn’t appear to be working exactly like Roy had hoped it would. He and his team had been assigned to a case of repeated alchemic burglaries that had recently been happening throughout the city. Due in large part to the hard work of his men, the team had succeeded in tracking them down in record time, tracking them to a seemingly abandoned warehouse in the industrial district of the city. Roy had been reluctant to bring Ed along, but the boy had insisted, and in the end the Colonel had decided that he needed to pick and choose his battles- after all, as far as they were aware, there was only one alchemist involved in these burglaries, and it probably wouldn’t be that difficult to apprehend him when he was surrounded on all sides. All in all, it would shouldn’t be that dangerous and it would probably be good for the boy to see the proper protocol and efficiency of a military raid.

Of course, nothing ever went according to plan. When Roy, Hawkeye, and Edward had burst into the warehouse (while Havoc, Breda and Falman pulled security, with Fuery on comms), they had been met with not one alchemist, but three. How they had missed the assistance of two additional alchemists, Roy had no idea, but it hardly mattered anymore. Before he even had time to register this miscalculation, Roy was attacked by the two seemingly junior alchemists, leaving Ed to go after the one who seemed to be in charge.

Although the two alchemists attacking him were sorely lacking in in subtlety and finesse, between the fact that they had him outnumbered and that he was trying to stick to nonlethal attacks, it took Roy longer than he would have liked to subdue them. As Hawkeye rushed over to help him restrain the two villains, Roy looked frantically for his youngest subordinate, eager to jump in and protect him from the danger. As he looked up, he saw a flash of red and gold as Edward leapt through the air, aiming a crushing kick to the hulking man’s face (why the boy insisted on using his fists instead of his alchemy to solve every problem, Roy would never know). Roy felt his stomach drop violently as he saw the criminal catch Ed’s foot and use his own momentum to swing him face first into the concrete. Instantly, all thoughts of nonlethal alchemy fled Roy’s mind as he was filled with a seething rage and protectiveness he hadn’t even realized he was capable of. As he took a step forward, half a second away from turning the alchemist into a pile of ash, two enormous concrete hands emerged from the ground and caught the criminal, restraining him in an instant- and there, still sitting on the floor with blood pouring from his nose and more hair out of his braid than in it, was Ed.

For a moment, everything was silent. Then Roy rushed over to his subordinate, suddenly desperate to reassure himself that the beating the kid just took wasn’t as bad as it had looked. 

“Fullmetal, are you alright?”

The boy flashed his wild animal grin, his eyes still alight with the excitement and adrenaline of a good fight, and as he did Roy balked at the blood that coated his teeth, dripping down from the steady nosebleed he was sporting. “m fine!” He called back, speaking around a mouthful of blood, and with the efficiency and practice of a seasoned sailor he screwed up his mouth and spat out a slimy glob of blood and saliva and- to Roy’s absolute horror- a small tooth.

“Fullmetal!” Roy cried immediately, “You are not fine! You knocked one of your teeth out!”

The boy, looking more curious than anything else, nudged the tooth with his boot, replying calmly, “Huh, I guess I did.” 

Immediately, Roy’s mind began to work through what he could do to rectify the situation, thinking out loud as he said, “I can take you to the dentist first thing tomorrow morning, the military should be able to cover the cost of the appointment and it shouldn’t take that long to-“

Still staring down at his boots, the boy just mumbled, “S okay, really, you don’t have to do that. I said I’m fine and I meant it.”

Suddenly annoyed at the boy’s stubbornness, Roy replied, “Fullmetal, I’m not asking. As your commanding officer, I’m your legal guardian, and if I say you’re going to the dentist, then you’re going-“

“I don’t need to go the dentist,” Ed grounded out, as if each word he uttered caused him physical pain, “because it wasn’t an adult tooth. It was gonna come out soon anyway.”

For a second, all Roy could do was stare at the boy in disbelief. Surely he didn’t mean…

From behind him he could he could hear the muffled snickers that signaled that the rest of the team had arrived sometime in the course of the conversation. 

“Chief, you tryna tell us that that’s a… a baby tooth?” Havoc asked, his voice full of mirth, sounding for all the world as if Christmas had come early. 

Instantly, Edward fixed the man with a glare so intense that Roy was surprised it didn’t knock out one of his teeth. “Who the HELL are you callin a baby?!”

“You know, I hear the tooth fairy pays pretty good money for a beauty like that,” Breda chimed in. 

“I am not a CHILD, Breda!”

As Ed stomped over to the rest of the team, bickering irritably with them as they teased him relentlessly for this newest evidence of his youth, Roy continued to stare at the tiny little tooth that had been left on the floor in a puddle of blood and spit. For the hundredth time, he was struck by just how young his youngest subordinate really was. Just 12 years old, and he’d already experienced so much pain and suffering… already single-handedly raised a younger brother through a large part of his own childhood… already achieved a level of mastery in alchemy that most adults could never even hope for. And here he was, making him into a soldier, a political pawn, a weapon… all of a sudden, Roy felt ill.

“You know what Edward would say if he knew what you were thinking right now,” Hawkeye said mildly, appearing at his shoulder, as she always did. She said it as a statement, not as a question, and Roy knew she was right- Ed would insist that this is what he wanted, what he needed to do, and that he would never regret a second of it if it meant he could fix his mistakes and help his little brother (although perhaps he wouldn’t use such mild terms). Still, it didn’t seem right that a child who still hadn’t even lost all his baby teeth should be spending his formative years being slammed into concrete floors by criminals.

“All we can do is protect him best we can,” Riza said softly, knowing his internal anguish as clearly as he did. “All we can do is surround him with people who care about him, and let him do the rest.”

Glancing up from the blood on the floor, Roy looked over to where his team was gathered around Ed. Fuery was carefully cleaning all of the blood from Ed’s face, as Havoc kept him in a headlock to keep him from squirming. Breda was mussing up his hair as Ed complained loudly, trying and failing to bat his hands away while Falman tried to placate him in his best calming tone. Despite his clear irritation, Ed couldn’t help but laugh at something Falman said, relaxing into the hold Havoc had him in as he did.

For the first time that night, Roy cracked a small smile. “You’re right, as always Lieutenant. Fullmetal will be just fine. Let’s go home.”


End file.
